Question:
US President Joe Biden left Washington, DC, today, Wednesday, for the Middle East on an official visit that includes “Israel”, the West Bank, and Saudi Arabia. (Al Arabiya Net 13/7/2022). Al-Yawm Al-Sabi had published on its website on 10/7/2022: (US President Joe Biden said that he will travel to the Middle East next week to start a new and promising chapter for the American role in the region…). Al-Sharq Al-Awsat had published on its website on 5/7/2022: (US State Department spokesman Ned Price said that Iran has repeatedly made demands in recent weeks and months outside the framework of the 2015 nuclear deal… He said that there is no other round of talks planned with Iran at the present time, according to Reuters news agency.).
The question now is: Does this mean that America has turned its back on the nuclear deal? And what is the purpose of Biden’s visit at this time? Does this visit have anything to do with the nuclear deal, or is this visit for other purposes? Can Iran become a nuclear power? May Allah bless you and bless by you and may Allah grant you victory and open doors for you.
Answer:
The question is of two parts: the first is about the issue of the nuclear agreement with Iran, and the second is about Biden’s visit, and here is the answer:
First: The Nuclear Deal:
1- The Iranian nuclear file, with its local, regional and international dimensions, is an important part of the American policy with Iran, and even overlaps with other issues to become of regional and international dimensions in the American strategy, so you see America since the signing of the deal in 2015 and its repudiation in 2018 and the negotiations to return to it, like what is happening today, is shifting right and left regarding it, according to the new developments in its policy. Looking closely at the United States’ strategic vision for the Iranian nuclear program, we find that the American policy is closer to managing this file than to resolving it! This American vision of the nuclear file is in no way separated from the American regional strategy in the Islamic and international region.
2- The objective fact that must be acknowledged is that Iran, in most of its foreign policies, is coordinating behind the scenes with America and does not depart from the American policy. Perhaps the American occupation of Iraq in 2003 revealed this coordination on a large scale, as the American and Iranian influence went hand in hand in Iraq, then the international coalition led by America against ISIS and the intervention in Syria, which did not strike any of the Iranian targets in Syria or its militias, so America left them to fight the revolution in Ash-Sham to eradicate it, and America, with its planes, struck the revolutionaries in Ash-Sham under the pretext of “terrorism”. This takes place only between countries that agree on the roles. The American and Iranian roles were aimed at preserving the American agent Bashar. Moreover, the US occupation of Afghanistan has also revealed the US-Iranian coordination, and some Iranian statements showed Iran’s favours for America in facilitating its occupation of Afghanistan!
3- After the end of the Iraq-Iran War in 1988 and the emergence of Iraq as a major military power, Iran began in 1989 to build its missile and nuclear program to cover up what looked like its loss in the war with Iraq. America has been officially helping Iran in nuclear research since the 1950s, and that research stopped after the Khomeini revolution, but later resumed in 1989. With the destruction of the Iraqi forces by the US army in 1990-1991, its expulsion from Kuwait, and the imposition of sanctions and inspection campaigns on Iraq, the arena was emptied regionally to highlight the Iranian power. The post-Cold War American policy was looking for an imaginary enemy to justify the American presence in military bases across the world after the fall of the Soviet Union, and Iran was the reason and the pretext. America has started to justify many of its policies by the Iranian threat, to the extent that Russia has been very surprised by America’s pretext to install the American missile shield in Poland and Romania due to Iranian missile threats!
4- Thus, the Iranian nuclear program and Iran’s rush to install thousands of uranium-enrichment devices are sounding alarm bells in the major European countries as well as the Gulf States. On closer examination, we find that all this was necessary for American policy in several respects:
a- Creating the Iranian threat to the Gulf countries, where the sources of oil are to enable America to offer protection to the rulers. President Trump was bragging that America provides protection to Saudi Arabia and demanded it to pay money in the form of blackmail and the mafia, saying that it will not last two weeks without American protection.
b- At the international level, America began imposing a more strategic siege on Russia and erected its missile shield near Russia’s borders, all under pretexts including protecting European countries from Iranian missiles.
5- With the growing European fears, the international powers began negotiating, and since 2006, with Iran, in the hope of controlling its nuclear program in a peaceful rather than military framework, and for this purpose, the P5+1 group, i.e., the five international nuclear powers + Germany, was established, despite the fact that America was one of those international powers. However, those nuclear negotiations with Iran were conducted by international powers without America’s direct participation, meaning that America was not serious in those negotiations, which lasted for 9 years (until 2015), to restrict the Iranian nuclear program, so the European countries, in addition to Russia and China, were holding session after session in a vicious cycle of negotiations. Those negotiations also helped to highlight Iran’s power and its dangers.
6- Moreover, the internal division in America has strongly affected the Iranian nuclear program. The Trump administration was the period in which the American division reached a dangerous point. President Trump at the time attacked the policy of his predecessor Obama regarding Iran’s nuclear program. In addition to his withdrawal from the nuclear deal in 2018, Trump announced extreme sanctions against Iran and opened the way for the Jewish entity to further undermine Iran, and because he behaves with “cowboy” arrogance, he humiliated Iran when Qasim Suleimani was killed, the commander of the Quds Force in its Revolutionary Guards at the beginning of January 2020, and because the Trump administration was in a state of complete harmony with the Jewish entity led by Netanyahu, unlike Obama’s Democratic administration, the Jewish entity has gone too far in striking Iranian targets, whether they are direct nuclear targets, such as sabotaging the Natanz facility, or indirect, such as the Jewish entity stealing sensitive nuclear documents from Iran, in addition to multiple assassinations of Iranian nuclear scientists and experts.
7- The Democrats in America, while they are outside the government, began to contact the pillars of the Iranian regime, especially with the then Foreign Minister, Javad Zarif, and promised them that the victory of the Democratic Party in the 2020 presidential elections will mean a return to the nuclear deal. This was a declared promise of the Democratic candidate Biden before he became president. Thus, Biden committed himself to returning to the nuclear deal with Iran by motives related to the internal division in America. Indeed, America returned to the nuclear negotiations with Iran shortly after President Biden assumed his duties in America at the beginning of 2021, but the negotiations are still in place, because America’s return to the nuclear deal with Iran is no longer a requirement of the American strategy, but rather it requires highlighting the Iranian threats again. In addition, the Republican representatives in Congress demanded that the new deal with Iran is presented to a vote in Congress and threatened to repudiate it again when they had the upper hand in Congress. This confused the negotiation process, and now a year and a half passed without the Biden administration being able to return to the nuclear deal with Iran.
8- Also the war in Ukraine casted a shadow over the issue of the nuclear deal. The Biden administration took it upon itself to guarantee oil supplies to Europe as an alternative to the Russian one, and this is one of the requirements of the American leadership to the West within the NATO alliance. The Biden administration turned its cards on the need to lift sanctions on Iran and push its oil trade to the international market. This is the same with Venezuela and Saudi Arabia. With regard to Iran, there was an American rush to speed up the conclusion of the nuclear deal with Iran during the month of March 2022, i.e., after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and the Biden administration was ready to respond to Iran’s demand to remove its Revolutionary Guard from the list of terrorism that the former president, Trump, listed. America’s return to the nuclear deal is around the corner as a result of the latest developments in US policy after the Ukraine war, but when Russia, which is part of the P5+1 group, took the condition that its trade relations with Iran be exempted from Western sanctions against Russia, America retracted from signing the deal. It is expected that if Russia remains on its terms, the issue of the nuclear deal will continue to be slow in the coming months until the end of the midterm elections for the US Congress in November 2022… It is noticeable that Biden is now focusing more on the issue of the midterm elections than on the nuclear deal with Iran.
Second: Biden’s Visit to the Region:
1- Those who look closely at Biden’s visit to the region will see it as a prelude to the midterm elections to raise the shares of Biden and his party in these elections, even if they are ostensibly wrapped up in other goals! Biden is in an internal crisis with the Republican Party, especially in two striking matters: the first is the Republican Party’s exploitation of Biden’s increased interest in the nuclear deal with Iran without pressure and more sanctions, as Trump was doing, and the second is Biden’s lack of interest in increasing and strengthening relations with the Jewish entity, as Trump was doing. Because these two matters affect the midterm elections, Biden is trying to address these two issues during these remaining months to the November 2022 midterm elections:
* The treatment of the first matter was that Biden presented this visit with the statement of the US State Department spokesman, Ned Price, which was reported by Al-Sharq Al-Awsat on 5/7/2022 (... that there is no other round of talks planned with Iran at the present time…). This is in addition to Biden’s ambiguous statements about the deal, which leads to the termination of the nuclear deal rounds, or a slowdown in them, until after the midterm elections to prevent the Republican Party from exploiting them against Biden and his party.
* Then he dealt with the second matter by declaring unprecedented support for the Jewish entity by passing the largest support package to Tel Aviv in history, estimated at more than 4 billion dollars… This is in addition to accelerating normalization with the Jewish state. All this is to ensure that the votes of the Jewish lobby in the midterm elections will be in his favour. To show more support than Trump and his party for the Jewish entity… Therefore, the timing of Biden’s visit to the region, especially to the Jewish entity, this month, July 2022, and expressing support for them earns Biden an electoral card from that lobby… This is in addition to increasing his popularity by showing the support of his agents and followers in the region! Especially the issue of energy from Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States. This raises his electoral shares, and this was confirmed by the following:
a- [The White House said that US President Joe Biden wants to use his visit to the Middle East - which he begins on Wednesday - to enhance the US role in a region that is steadily gaining strategic importance. US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan reviewed - in a press conference at the White House, on Monday - the objectives of this visit, which is Biden’s first in his presidency, and includes Israel, Palestine and then Saudi Arabia, in which he will meet with the leaders of the Gulf Cooperation Council countries, Egypt, Jordan and Iraq. Regarding the file of normalization, Sullivan referred to the US administration’s desire to strengthen what he called the path to improving the relationship between Israel and more Arab countries, saying that any normalization is positive. Biden had called on the Gulf countries to increase oil production, in light of high prices above the level of $100 a barrel; this contributed to high inflation rates, in light of global concerns about energy and food security, with the continuation of the Russian war on Ukraine.] (Al Jazeera 11/7/2022)
b- AlJazeera published on its website on 10/7/2022 an article in the Washington Post: [... US President Joe Biden said that he will travel to the Middle East next week to start a new and promising chapter for the American role in the region… And in the article published by the Washington Post, the US President said that the meeting of the region’s leaders in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, would be an indication of the possibility of a more stable Middle East, as he put it…noting that he would be the first American president to travel from Israel to Jeddah…With regard to relations with Israel, Biden indicated that his administration passed the largest support package to Tel Aviv in history, estimated at more than 4 billion dollars…]
c- Al-Sharq Al-Awsat published on its website on 7/5/2022: [Washington: “Al-Sharq Al-Awsat Online” US State Department spokesman, Ned Price, said today (Tuesday) that Iran has repeatedly made demands in recent weeks and months outside the framework of the 2015 nuclear deal. Adding that the new demands indicate a lack of seriousness on the part of Tehran. In Doha last week, indirect talks between Tehran and Washington, which aimed to break the deadlock on how to salvage the nuclear deal, ended without the hoped-for progress. Price said that there is no other round of talks planned with Iran at the present time, according to Reuters news agency.]
d- It is mentioned in Al-Youm Al-Sabi, 5/5/2022: [Several challenges are facing US President Joe Biden and the Democratic Party with the approaching mid-term elections for Congress. It comes after successive crises that hit the US administration, which failed for nearly 3 months to dissuade Russia from continuing its war inside the Ukrainian territory, despite the series of successive economic sanctions it imposed against Moscow, and the accompanying global effects on inflation indicators and the faltering of energy supplies, which prompted the US Federal Reserve to raise interest rates by 0.5%, the largest increase in the past 22 years. According to analysts and American media, the mid-term elections are a referendum on Biden’s presidency in his first two years in office…]
Thus, the main objective of Biden’s visit to the region at this particular time, that is, before the midterm elections, this goal is as we mentioned at the beginning: (The one who looks closer at Biden’s visit to the region will see that it as a prelude to the midterm elections to raise the shares of Biden and his party in these elections, even if it is ostensibly wrapped in other goals!)
Third: In Conclusion, we emphasize two points:
1- These so-called major countries are punctuated by fragility that sometimes leads to heated conflict between their parties and components. But this is what is painful, they find a solution to their problems in our lands and at our expense! Biden visits our countries, taking off from the people most hostile to us, the Jewish entity occupying our blessed land of Palestine, and then heads directly to the land of the Hijaz, where its rulers will receive him submissively and rejoicingly. Biden is proud (that he will be the first American president to travel from “Israel” to Jeddah…and offers the Jewish state the largest package of support in history…) However, the rulers of the House of Saud are not ashamed, rather they even lost the shame! Biden then will meet with the rulers of the Gulf States to discuss increasing energy production to reduce inflation in America, and then he will meet with this group with the rulers of the Egyptian, Iraqi and Jordanian regimes and the Palestinian Authority to discuss the file of normalization, saying (any normalization is considered positive) ... This is how Biden wants them to be normalizing instead of in jihad to remove the Jewish entity! And then those rulers applaud Biden without fear of Allah, His Messenger and the believers! Instead of America and the Jewish entity being the enemy:
((هُمُ الْعَدُوُّ فَاحْذَرْهُمْ قَاتَلَهُمُ اللَّهُ أَنَّى يُؤْفَكُونَ))
“They are the enemy, so beware of them. May Allah destroy them; how are they deluded?” [Al-Munafiqun: 4].
The rulers are normalizing with them and prostrate to them!
2- As for what was stated at the end of the question (Can Iran become a nuclear power?), yes it could be if it did not coordinate its foreign policy with America, as was stated, then it would become a significant power… But Iran, by linking itself with American policy to revolve in its orbit, will prevent it from being one. It continues to do so because its ruling elite has continued its attachment to American policy and is inseparable from it in any case. Instead of controlling the nuclear deal, it linked this to the talks in Vienna, i.e., with America’s approval: [The Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman, Saeed Khatibzadeh, said in a press conference, “If a deal is achieved in Vienna tomorrow, all the measures that Iran has taken are technically reversible.” (The Independent Arabic, 13/6/2022)]. Therefore, a fundamental change in Iran is unlikely unless Iran rules by Islam in its domestic and foreign policy, and completely severs its relationship with America, with no going back after it… We say this and we rule it out from happening by the current Iranian politicians, but we say it:
((مَعْذِرَةً إِلَى رَبِّكُمْ وَلَعَلَّهُمْ يَتَّقُونَ))
“To be absolved before your Lord and perhaps they may fear Him.” [Al-A’raf: 164].
